Disease-resistant apple varieties

One of the reasons I'm
excited to experiment with a high
density apple planting
is because it will allow me to try out more varieties. When
grafted onto standard or semistandard rootstocks, apples require a
lot of space, and I only have room for four in our forest garden.
Being able to test several more varieties to see how they handle our
microclimate and disease pressure will be very valuable (and tasty).

On the other hand, I've
learned the hard way that it's not even worth trying apple varieties on
our homestead if they aren't resistant to cedar
apple rust.
Your neck of the woods may have its own apple Achilles heel, but the
following varieties went onto my short list due to their disease
resistance for my area:

The data for my table
came from The
Holistic Orchard, Grow
Fruit Naturally, The Best Apples to Buy and Grow, and our favorite local apple
nursery's website.
The astute reader will notice that heirloom varieties (like Yellow
Transparent, an old Russian apple) are mixed together with modern
inventions (like Sweet Sixteen, barely older than I am). The
heirloom varieties developed the hard way, standing out amid seedling
apples that perished when not cared for, while the
more recent apples have been bred with scientific knowlege of
disease-resistant genes. In the end, it doesn't really matter
where the resistance comes from, and I decided to try some out of each
category.

Of course, I also wanted
to spread my harvest out throughout the year, so I ended up choosing
Yellow Transparent and Pristine as early apples, Zestar (not resistant, but we
wanted to try it anyway), Summer Rambo, and Sweet Sixteen for early
fall, and Enterprise, Empire, Grimes Golden, and Mammoth Black Twig as
late apples/keepers. In a few years, I'll probably learn that
some of those apples thrive in our climate while others are
losers. Then it'll be time to cut out the bad trees and go back
to the drawing board to experiment with some other disease-resistant
apples.

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Our land came with a dozen or so elderly standard apples - Grimes Golden is easily the best among them (others are VA Beauty, Cortland, and Gana.) We don't seem to have the Cedar Rust but it is a healthy tree and bears the most. We call it the Deer Tree because they congregate under it (right up until Opening Day!)

De --- I have heard really good things about Grimes Golden. I steered clear for a long time because I'd read it was one parent of Golden Delicious, which I consider insipid. But reports on the internet and in books suggest that Grimes Golden is ten times tastier, and your experience seems to bear that out.

Brian --- I know --- I was laughing at myself as I typed that. But, really, there was a longer version!

Wiz --- You're right --- we need to explore more heirloom pears too. They definitely get a lot fewer pests and diseases than apples. The trouble is, I've yet to find any as tasty as apples, but I'll admit I've tried far fewer heirlooms. I'm going to work harder at grafting onto our two pear trees this winter in hopes of finding some varieties that win a taste test.

I have been watching local apple and pear trees planted in various public spaces. I found one pear tree that has been producing quite a bit of fruit for 2 consecutive years. Though hard fruit, most pears from this tree are quite sweet and bug free. I picked the first this year one or two months ago and have been picking them weekly just to see how long the production phase of that tree is. So far they still taste good and are not obviously 'going by'.

There is a golden delicious type tree nearby. Much buggier fruit and it has pretty much gone by now. An Austrian friend says he remembers that pears were grown much more than apples in his youth.

I just bought a fruit picker to reach the higher up pears as I have picked all the low hanging ones :).

I am planning to try to germinate its seeds to see if I can grow another.

Wiz --- Sepp Holzer talks extensively about pears too, which made me guess that at least in his part of Europe, they might be a bigger deal than over here. I have had some homegrown Asian pears that were top notch, but most of my experience with locally grown pears was either Bartletts (good at peak, but get mushy and awful fast) or gritty old-timey pears that have a great taste but are sometimes painful to eat.

I love hearing about your wild apple and pear harvests! I did that in town a lot as a kid.

I'll look forward to hearing about your seed-grown pear experiments. At worst, they'd make great rootstocks to graft onto.

I must say I am really excited about all of the talk on your blog about apples lately (and especially excited to see that you're using "The Holistic Orchard" as your next book club book - it's on my Christmas wish list, so I won't be able to participate much, but I will enjoy reading about your thoughts on it! We're planning on planting our orchard in the next couple of years (nothing too big on our little plot of land, just two or three apples, a pear and a berry patch), and it sounds like now is when we need to start laying the ground work!

I also just wanted to mention that, particularly when it comes to heirloom varieties, one should never count out a parent, just because one doesn't like the child (i.e. not wanting to try Grimes Golden because it is probably a parent of the very blah Golden Delicious). Red Delicious are one of the most insipid apples out there, but if you can get a hold of the original Delicious apple, they are beautiful both in looks and flavor, with an enchanting crispness and a skin that has just enough "chew" to add pleasantly to the experience; of course, they're still quite worthless as cooking apples, but eaten fresh, they live up to their name.

Similarly, if you want a pear tree, make sure you get samples of the fruits before you plant (and don't look down on one tree just because you think you know what it tastes like based on supermarket pears). I hated pears from childhood; I just couldn't stand the mealy texture and generally thought the flavor was quite poor. Then I moved into an apartment which had a huge pear tree growing very happily in the backyard. Those pears were sweet and succulent with a smooth flesh and a thin skin; I couldn't get enough of them. So imagine my surprise when a knowledgeable friend took a look at the tree and the fruits and said, "well, it's just an old Bartlett." "But," I stuttered, having been offered numerous Bartlett pears from the grocery store, "these pears taste good!" Perhaps my tree's fruits were so good because it was such a happy tree, heh.

Anyway, keep those orchard/apple posts coming; they are much appreciated and all getting bookmarked so that I can find them again as we embark on our own orchard journey!

Sounds like your narrowing your cultivar options down but the million dollar question is what are your sources for these (local, online, mail order)? Assuming B9 or M9 root stocks with a row spacing of 3' X 10'?

Ikwig --- I highly recommend the book as one to buy and read slowly. There's a lot of information to digest.

I'm curious to hear what is going in your little orchard? Or perhaps you haven't chosen varieties yet?

I had a similar experience with Bartletts, but the apples were delicious only at their peak, and there were bushels of them! Soon, they were nearly as insipid as the storebought. (I guess that's a reason to graft multiple varieties onto a pear so they don't all ripen at once.)

BSmith --- I actually went ahead and ordered our apples already, but would love to hear your suggestions for future reference! You can read about my plans here.

The short answer is 3 foot spacing on bud.9 for most of them, which I ordered from Grandpa's orchard (mostly because they had a lot of great varieties to choose from on the rootstock I wanted, and I bought some peaches from them two years ago that came with awesome root structures). I also ordered a few semi-dwarf trees from a local guy to test one reader's suggestion that you can prune a larger tree down and have a healthier tree.

Anna TWO thumbs up for Grandpa's Orchard! I agree their product is top quality especially if you are looking for particular rootstock and variety at a low volume.

I've also had good success with Adam's County Nursery. I'd also recommend Stark Bro's if you can get a deal and work through the commercial side of the company not retail. Miller Nursery and many others have been hit or miss for me.

BSmith --- It sounds like your experiences line up with mine very well, although I haven't tried Adam's County Nursery yet. They were actually the other company I was considering, though, because I like their selection and rootstock choices. Who do you prefer between Grandpa's and Adams County?

I've had a bit of hit or miss with Starks Brothers, but that could just be that I didn't research disease resistance of the varieties well enough. Another reader suggested that Starks grows their plants in several different locations, and some do better than others.

I had a winner and a loser from Miller, but that could have been variety selection again.

I prefer Grandpa's Orchard for low volume orders if I have one or two unique cultivars expire out of a particular row/block otherwise I usually go with ACN for higher volume.

Grandpa's Orchard is good on short notice but ACN usually needs advanced notice. There's always pro's and con's but both of these companies will take care of you if you have a problem and that's what counts!

You may want to follow Jon Clements (UMASS) on Twitter for updates on the tall spindle and fruiting wall research he has been doing. The look of commercial orchards will be changing in the next decade to high density plantings. There is a higher initial cost but the returns can be seen sooner and the maintenance is lower.

P.S. - If I was you I'd go with some Sweet Cherries such as a Regina or Black Gold on Gisela 5 from Grandpa's Orchard. You know there's always room for one more cultivar Enjoy!

BSmith --- It sounds like I made the right choice for now, then --- thanks for the followup. I've been reading various websites by Jon Clements, but still have more research to do on care of our high density apples, so I suspect I'll be reading much more this winter.

I actually got very disappointed by dwarf sweet cherries. I nursed a White Gold Cherry for years, but it was always completely defoliated by Japanese beetles and it never set fruit. I did my best to knock the insects off, but the cherry was by far their favorite, above the grapes, raspberries, etc. Everything else seemed able to handle a bit of Japanese beetle nibbling as long as I picked the beetles once a day during the worst period, but the cherry couldn't handle it, and I wasn't willing to spray, so I finally cut it down.